Diagnostic results: No diagnostic test performed.
Assessment:
Mental Status Examination:
Ms. F. B., a 28-year-old African American lady who looks her stated age, neatly groomed and clean. she is cooperative with examiner with no evidence of any abnormal motor activity. She was able to maintain adequate eye contact. Her speech is clear, coherent, spontaneous, appropriate with normal rate, volume, and tone. Her mood is crying/tearful, and her affect dysphoric. Her thought process is coherent, and her thought content is unremarkable. No evidence of hallucination. Cognitively, she is alert and oriented to person, place, time, situation, and time. She has no apparent deficits to attention, concentration, memory, and abstract thinking is concrete. Her insight and judgment is fair. There is risk of harm to self, and others.
Differential Diagnoses:
Adjustment Disorder
An adjustment disorder is an emotional or behavioral reaction to a stressful event or change in a person’s life that hinders social performance and functioning. It occurs during a period of adaptation to an important existential change or a stressful event, whether traumatic or not, and results in a depressive reaction or disturbance of emotions and behavior for a long or short time (Tonerio et al., 2019). The patient is in a postpartum period and postpartum period, in turn, involves the emotional and physical changes of pregnancy that tend to intensify and generate profound social, psychological, and physical alterations in women, which increases their risk of suffering psychiatric disorders (Tonerio et al., 2019). There is need to early and appropriate assessment of postpartum women who report emotional disturbances as Childbirth can trigger AD, which may, consequently, harm the health of mothers and newborns and affect the relationship of postpartum women with the people around them. To be diagnosed with adjustment disorder, a person must exhibit emotional or behavioral symptoms related to an identified stressor. The stressor does not have to be ongoing Multifarious, or recurring. Individuals or whole families may be affected by the stressor (Bachem, & Casey, 2018).